She didn’t respond to the accusation in his words, only said, “But now it’s morning—take it off.”
Instead of an appropriate response, he lowered his head and kissed her, his hand in her scalp clenching with aggressive force. The same trickle of heat she felt every time he came near hit her low in the pelvis. His scent clouded her thoughts as her legs began quivering.
He first stroked her gently with his tongue, but in a flash of movement, he adjusted the angle of her chin and went back for more. He was greedy now—she felt it. His teeth nipped at her and became biting; she felt the connection like a live wire that radiated from her nipples to the heat between her thighs.
As if he craved control, he lifted her bound arm a couple of inches, stretching her torso, his head dropping to the side of her neck. Tingles ran down her spine as she felt a wave of addictive heat settle over her. He kissed a trail of heat over her neck and up her chin until he found her lips again. She began kissing him back.
At her response, he lifted his head and her eyes flew open. Through the layers of sexual heat, she understood he was manipulating her physically to prove some kind of diabolical point. She flattened her lips. “Do you like that? Having me under your control?”
His eyes flared. “I fucking love it.” With a rush of movement, he brought their entwined arms down and thrust them behind her back in a display of dominant strength that had little to do with the contention between them and everything to do with sex.
His pelvis settled more threateningly between her thighs, his erection pushing up and into her mound. Through a haze of arousal she realized he was still on a short leash from the night before, although she didn’t understand exactly why. She lowered her voice and in a placating tone said, “I haven’t been fighting you. I give in every time and you have to know that I enjoy it.” She swallowed and continued, “Why are you doing this?”
He pushed harder against the juncture of her thighs with his erection. “To prove a point.”
“And what point would that be?”
“That I can.” With those words, he quickly undid the row of buttons on her shirt. Pulling their joined arms from behind her, he lifted their hands to her breasts in tandem. She pulled in a startled breath as he released enough slack on the tie to grab hold of her hand. He plastered her palm to her breast and held it there with his, his fingers delving between hers to find her nipple and tweak it. “It pisses me off that you leave my bed. You’ll sleep tied to me for the rest of your life if that’s what it takes to keep you beside me.”
Why couldn’t he realize that wasn’t what she needed? The question abruptly left her brain as she heard his roar of frustrated arousal. With speedy movements, he released his end of the tie and sank to his knees in front of her. He pushed her shorts and panties to the floor, tossing the garments away, before lifting her one of her legs over his shoulder, his mouth promptly finding her clit.
Stars went off in her head as she pushed everything else away and concentrated only on Max and the conflagration that was shattering her senses.
****
Five days later, Erin was slowly going out of her mind. She didn’t know what the hell kind of campaign Max was waging, but every night she went to sleep tied to him. Every morning she went down to his office with the tie dangling from her wrist.
For five days, the outcome had been the same. He’d sealed her inside the office long enough to go down on her, always forcefully—devastatingly—always making her come with an explosion of heat and need that she’d never known existed before Max entered her life.
And he never finished the encounters with a happy ending for himself. He’d simply rise above her and lift her chin. He’d kiss her deeply and she knew he did it so she could taste herself on his lips. Then finally, he’d loosen the knot around her wrist and slip the tie in his pocket, as if setting her free for the day.
It was enough to make a girl start losing her mind.
She was getting in so deep that she didn’t think she’d ever be able to find happiness without Max in her life. She began dreading going back to the States without him. The angst she was feeling was enough to make her want to get away from her own thoughts. She needed some fresh air to clear her head.
****
Max glanced up from the map he was studying when his ranch manager knocked on the door casing. The man rarely came inside—Max shut the laptop and gave him his attention. “What’s going on?”